HERE we are.

The government is to announce if the Dingoes/Wild Dogs are to be protected in Victoria.

As I write this, there have been meetings held in Omeo, Gelantipy, Hopetoun, Tallangatta and Mansfield.

Government consultation with farmers consisted of five two-hour drop-in sessions to cover the 15 wild dog management zones in Victoria and were hastily arranged because of the approaching deadline. 

Emma Nankervis of the North East Wild Dog Action Group said that the Tallangatta meeting was attended by around 100 local farmers and the concept of the meeting was good with farmers being able to ask their questions of the government representatives.

Unfortunately, there was limited time to discuss things in detail at the meeting, and the noise in the hall made it difficult to hear and be heard.

A big red flag for Ms Nankervis was the way the biodiversity group collected numbers of dingoes.

They were using deer cameras that had been set up in the state forest to monitor the numbers.

Ms Nankervis said that the wild dog management officers have cameras in the forest, yet they collected information from the cameras set up to assess deer populations and gave no thought to the time of year when dingoes would be birthing and feeding young and would be less active outside of a burrow.

“Why, the biodiversity group would use the deer cameras when they had access to the cameras set up to monitor the wild dogs is beyond ridiculous - and then they expect us to take this information seriously,” she said.

“I think the Department of Agriculture have a better understanding of the issue but they also need to convince the Department of Environment’s biodiversity group in order to keep the existing legislation in place.”

The North East Wild Dog Action Group have released a letter asking for Environment minister Steve Dimopoulos to consider these questions.

The comprehensive consultation promised by the Victorian government, back in September 2023, has taken 11 months to be offered to farmers?

Yet Traditional Owners and conservationists have been invited to forums and included in the ‘research’ well before this, farmers are the people on the front line, dealing with the impacts and managing the risks caused by dogs.

Why have they been excluded from earlier consultation?

The Victorian government promised to count the dogs, but have used an existing feral deer monitoring system to do this instead of their own specifically trained DEECA wild dog controllers that have the existing skill set and equipment to monitor and count dogs; why?

Has there been independent research done on the impact of dogs to native animals?

Why did we have to use ‘Freedom of Information legislation’ to obtain information on wild dogs that used to be available to the public?

How is the Victorian Government going to manage the Biosecurity risk as wild dogs transfer diseases such as hydatids and neospora?

Animal cruelty, has this been considered? Pets and livestock are being traumatized and killed!

How is the ever-increasing risk to public safety going to be managed?

Minister Dimopoulos PLEASE

Slow down: There’s been over 11 months to review this, don’t make a rushed decision at the last minute, without being fully informed. We don’t have enough factual data, the promised consultation hasn’t been detailed enough.

Go back a step: What are we protecting and what are we risking? Reassess! Keep the unprotection order for another five years while unbiased research is conducted, sensible change takes time and planning.

Talk with us, not at us: Let’s have some genuinely creative consultation. Dog management can work when its local, landscape based, cooperative and blind to state and territory borders. We call this NIL TENURE PLANNING, and it’s by far the best way to manage dogs for all involved.

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Can you imagine walking the trails or camping in the Grampians or Budj Bim with the dingoes?

Dingoes are not afraid of people on K’gari (Fraser) Island which has been in the news again recently for attacking a child. There have been 279 reported dingo attacks, with 39 of those considered major and the death of a nine-week old baby.

There is a reason that we have a dingo fence and the Queensland government issue notices on protecting yourself from dingoes.

The South Australian government built the Wild Dog and Dingo fence in 1946 and to this day is still maintained. It was built to protect the sheep industry and is 2150 kilometres long and goes from the Great Australian Bight to the border with New South Wales.

Now we wait to see if we farmers actually matter to this government.